


Dream Weaver

by Call_Me_Clarence



Category: Supernatural
Genre: First Kiss, M/M, Miscommunication, djinn dream, idiots to lovers, suicide (but not really), written for the supernaturalpromptchallenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-03
Updated: 2020-03-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 01:21:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22995364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Call_Me_Clarence/pseuds/Call_Me_Clarence
Summary: Dean is attacked by a Djinn in Purgatory 2.0, and the fantasy world the Djinn shows him opens his eyes to just what his life could look like. If only everything wasn't constantly falling apart.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 5
Kudos: 87





	Dream Weaver

**Author's Note:**

> There is a suicide scene at the very beginning of this fic, but it's not like a suicide suicide. If this is too triggering please don't read. Stay safe. 
> 
> Now that that's out of the way, please enjoy!

Castiel stands in front of Dean, hands up in a non-threatening gesture, eyes wide with fear.

“Dean,” he starts slowly, taking a careful step forward. “Put down the gun.” 

Dean cocks the trigger, pressing the barrel more firmly against his temple.

“Stay back, _you son of a bitch_.” Dean growls. 

Castiel stops his subtle movements. Lowers his hands to his sides. 

“ _Dean_ .” And now he was bringing out the waterworks. “ _Please, don’t do this_.” 

The way his voice shook, the absolute agony in his eyes. The display makes Dean sick to his stomach. Dean should’ve done this ages ago, but it was shit like this that had held him back, made him question himself. Made him question everything. 

But this had been going on for too long now. It was time to end it.

A sudden loud banging on the door to his room has Dean flinch, but he still keeps his guard up.

“Dean? Dean!” It’s Sammy. He continues to pound on the locked door, calling his brother's name. “Dean, what’s going on in there?! DEAN!”

“Please, Dean. You’re brother’s here now. You don’t want to do this in front of him.” 

Dean keeps his glare aimed on Cas, but then he smiles, causing a wary look to come over Cas’ face.

“How could he have known?” Dean asks, equal parts bitter and smug.

“What?” 

“Why is Sammy here, Cas?” Dean asks over the sound of the continued banging and pleading of his brother.

“He’s worried about you, Dean. We both are. Please, just put down the--”

“But how could he have known? You haven’t had the chance to text him. I sure as hell didn’t. No one’s been yelling or making a ruckus.” Dean tilts his head to the side, “So how could he have known?”

Castiel hesitates, unable to think up a lie. 

“Yeah that’s what I thought.” Dean takes a deep breath, muscles tensing to pull the trigger.

“NO!” Cas shouts, lunging at Dean. Lunging at him with an Angel Blade in hand. 

Dean feels the sharp blade peirce into his skin before there’s a loud bang and everything goes dark.

~~~~

There’s a moment of floating in darkness. Dean feels as if he’s waking up from a dream, put stuck in sleep paralysis, unable to open his eyes. He has time to think, to worry. Had he managed to pull the trigger? Or had Cas taken him out first, and that loud noise he heard was nothing more than Sam breaking through the door. 

Well, Dean figured one of two things was going to happen. 

One: He’d be trapped in The Empty forever, forced into a dreamless sleep, alone in the dark. 

Or two….

````````

Dean wakes with a sharp gasp. He’s laying on his side in some field, everything around him tinted with a washed out grey. Even the Leviathan corpse a few feet in front of him. 

He sits up slowly, taking in the rest of his surroundings; he’s still in the leviathan version of an elephant graveyard, but all the blossoms have been burnt to a crisp.

And he’s completely alone.

“No…” 

Dean gets painfully to his feet, looking around, but there's no sign of the Angel anywhere. 

“Cas!” he shouts. There’s no answer. “Cas?!”

The bastards must have taken him. But why leave Dean behind? 

A sudden rustling sound catches Dean’s attention, and he turns towards it, shotgun raised amd at the ready. A few yards off Dean sees a figure moving on the ground, obviously struggling, in pain. 

Dean’s face contorts in rage as he approaches the weakened thing. 

“You’re one twisted son of a bitch, you know that?” Dean growls at the injured Djinn, raising his shotgun. It’s no dagger dipped in lambs blood, but he knows from experience that enough shots to the head will wipe him out just as easy.

“Please.” The Djinn begs, “I am already weak. And in purgatory. I’m no danger to humans here. You protect them, yes? Please. Let me go.” 

“After that stunt you pulled? Not likely.”

“I gave you your greatest wish. You could have lived a full lifetime in the dream. A perfect life. One without loss. Without monsters and sacrifice.” 

Dean clenches his teeth together. He feels dirty at having had this thing running around in his mind, learning all his greatest desires, using them against him. 

“No thanks. I’d rather have the real thing.” Dean raises his shotgun to shoot the bastard, but stops at the Djinn’s sudden laughter.

“Do you really think you can have that life I have shown to you?” the laughter causes the Djinn to cough up some blood, but he seems unphased by it, instead giving Dean a hateful, crimson smile. “The only way someone like you finds any happiness in this life, is in dreams.” 

“Yeah, maybe you’re right.” he says, lowering his shotgun with a smirk that doesn’t reach his eyes. The Djinn looks hopeful for a moment. Until Dean drops the smile. “But I haven’t given up on reality. Not yet.” Dean pulls out his pistol instead. The Djinn only has a moment to look afraid before Dean fills his skull with bullets.

~~~~~~~

“You don’t have to do that, Cas.” Dean protests for the tenth time.

“It’s the least I can do--literally, seeing as I can’t heal you at the moment.” 

“Cas--”

“And you should have had this antidote hours ago.” Cas finishes up the touches and hands the cup of putrid smelling liquid to Dean. “You should’ve told me about the Djinn attack earlier.”

“Yeah, well we had bigger things to worry about.” Dean downs the liquid quickly, making a face and gagging afterwards. “I swear this stuff tastes worse each time you take it.”

“Maybe you should stop being attacked by Djinn if you hate the taste so much.” Castiel says, grabbing the cup from where Dean had sat it on the table. He’s halfway to the sink before he stops, sighing and setting the cup down on the metal island instead, and turning back to face Dean. 

“I’m sorry, that was uncalled for. I’m the one who left you there, unprotected. My one concern was getting the leviathan away from you, I didn’t consider--”

“It’s fine, Cas.” Dean waves a dismissive hand, before perking up a little. “Hey, grab some of that whiskey, will ya?”

Castiel picks up the bottle from where it sits on the counter, and stares at it dubiously. “Are you sure that’s wise? Mixing Djinn antidote with Jack Daniels?”

“It’s fine.” Dean assures. “Plus, it’s the only thing that can wash this taste out.”

Castiel obliges with a disbelieving brow. He brings the whiskey plus two small glasses to the table and sits down across from Dean.

Dean grabs the whiskey with the same enthusiasm as a kid snatching a bag of candy. 

“You know.” he starts as he unscrews the lid and pours them each a healthy dose of amber liquid. “The dream wasn’t all bad. Actually it was pretty awesome.”

“Babes, beers and burgers?” Castiel asks sarcastically.

“Harty har har.” Dean rolls his eyes and takes a sip of his drink, Castiel mirroring him. “No, it was, uh, actually kinda like how things are now.” 

“Really?” Castiel quirks a brow.

“Yeah, except everything seemed to have worked out for us, ya know? No chuck. Sam and Eileen weren’t,” Dean nods his head towards the direction of the war-room, in which he was pretty sure poor Sammy was getting dumped. Dean felt bad for the kid, but didn’t blame Eileen in the slightest either. He understood how she felt. Hell, he’d been struggling with the same maddening question of ‘am I just doing something because I was scripted to’ right along with her. “And Jack was…” Dean looks up to judge Cas’ reaction at the mention of Jack.

“He was alive in your dream?” Castiel asks. He doesn’t seem upset. Simply curious. Maybe a bit jealous.

“Yeah. He was.” Dean sniffs and takes another, larger drink.”Had him enrolled in school for some reason.” Dean huffs a laugh.

“He would’ve enjoyed that.” Castiel smiles.

Dean looks up at Cas, wondering if he should continue. Tell Cas what else he’d seen in that fantasy world. 

“Cas, actually, there’s, uh, something else that happened in the dream, and, uh,” Dean chuckles nervously. “Well, you were in it, obviously. And you even lived here at the Bunker. I mean Jack was here, so you being here made sense. But also--” Dean loses his breath, looks up at Cas, hopefully for some reassurance or something. Dean’s pretty sure they’d been flirting around this thing for a while now. He was pretty sure he wasn’t stepping over any lines here. 

“Dean,” Castiel says slowly, looking like the word was painful for him to say. He looks up at Hunter with pleading eyes. “Perhaps--” he stops himself, clenching his jaw and looking down at the table, lips working as if they didn’t want to say what he was gonna say, and yet Cas was determined to force them into forming words anyway, “Maybe now isn’t the best time.” he forces out.

_Wow_.

Okay.

“Yeah, yeah.” Dean scoffs. “Sharing dreams is a bit too slumber party for me anyways.” he huffs a fake laugh, staring into his whiskey, wishing he could drown in it. 

So apparently he’d read that situation wrong. 

‘ _Maybe that Djinn was right_ ’ he had time to think before Sam walks in, stricken face telling Dean that his brother needed him to stop his own moping and be a shoulder to lament on right now. Dean could do that. And gladly did. Anything to get him to stop thinking about how badly he just fucked up.

  
  


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dean grabs his keys from his room and heads towards Bunker doors. He’s the only sober one, surprisingly, and their ‘We Beat Chuck’ party was beginning to get low on booze. The last thing anyone wanted was for a bunch of hunters, werewolves, and a Queen of Hell to start rioting over the lack of alcohol.

“Dean!” Sam calls out to him when Dean passes through the library. 

Sam is stupid drunk at this point, he stands from his chair and almost falls back down into it. An amused Eileen helps him to his feet, and then over to where Dean is holding back laughter.

“Where’re you goin’?” he asks eloquently.

“Beer run. Be back in a few.” 

Sam stumbles over to stand in front of Dean, putting a hand on his brother's shoulder to balance himself.

“Where’s Cas?” 

Dean’s brows dips down in confusion, and suspicion. 

“Don’t know. Dude went AWOL before Garth even showed up. Who knows with that guy.”

“Maybe you should call him.” Sam suggests, poking Dean in the chest with his free hand. “An’ then you could go on th’ beer run together?” he smiles happily at Dean once he’d finished slurring his words at him.

“Real subtle, Sam..” Eileen quips. 

“What?” Sam looks back at Eileen, distraught. And then poorly stage whispers, “Really?”

“Alright sasquatch. Go sit down before you fall down and kill somebody.” Dean helps a pouting Sam back over to the table before turning to Eileen. “You got him?”

“I’ve got him.” she assures, and then smiles. “But maybe Sam is right. You should call Castiel.” 

Dean could feel himself start to blush, so quickly gave a line about ‘that being his que to leave’ and booked it for the safe confines of Baby.

Once he was out of the Bunker, walking across the gravel to where he’d parked the Impala, a voice calls out to him. Dean turns to see Castiel standing near his pimpmobile, as if he’d just arrived.

“Dean.”

Dean halts his stride and waits for Castiel to catch up to him.

“Where are you going?” Castiel looks back to the Bunker and at the plethora of cars still parked around it. It was obvious a party still rolled on inside.

“Beer run.” Dean says hoarsely, then clears his throat “I’m going on a beer run.” 

“May I join you?” 

This was one of those moments that made Dean still wonder if Chuck was still writing the script. Or maybe Becky this time. Hell, maybe even Sam and Elieen.

“Su-Sure.” Dean falters before power walking to the Impala and getting in.

Castiel gets into the car as well, and after a moment turns to look at Dean.

“Umm, Dean?” he questions. “Are we going, or…?”

“What?” Dean looks up from where he’d zoned out on the steering wheel to Cas’ amused face. “Oh! Right.” Dean blushes and fumbles with his keys as he starts the car.

~ _You’re my Angel! Come and save me tonight!_ ~

Aerosmith blares across the speakers before Dean can dart out a hand to switch off the radio.

Castiel chuckles, “Not a big Aerosmith fan?”

“It was… loud.” Dean stammers.

“Okay.” he says decisively, deciding now would be a good time to actually, you know, drive and all. 

Dean reaches up to put Baby in drive, but Castiel stops him with a hand over Dean’s. Dean looks down at Cas’ hand, then up to his face in alarm. This was… probably normal. The touch had Dean feeling all kinds of ways, but it was definitely just a platonic hand touch. This was fine. Dean wasn’t a freakin’ Vulcan or anything.. ‘ _What am I even on about?!_ ’ Dean’s inner voice screams at him hysterically.

“Actually, maybe it’s best I say this before we’re on the road.” Castiel explains himself. But still doesn’t remove his hand. 

“Say what?”

“I think we should… talk.”

“O-kay.” Dean swallows nervously. A talk? That was normal too. Right? They had talks. Lots of talks. So why did Dean feel like all the air had just been sucked out of the Impala.

“I wanted to ask about when the Djinn attacked you in purgatory.” 

Dean feels his stomach drop, his hands dropping from the steering wheel as well, causing Cas’ hand to fall away.

“Why?” he asks apprehensively.

“You never got to finish telling me about your dream.” 

“Drop it, Cas. It doesn’t matter.” Dean sniffs and tries to put on a bored face. “Listen, are we going or not. Got a lot of thirsty people back there--”

“I think it does matter.” Castiel says seriously. “And I think…” he looks down at his hands, then to the glove box, the to just over Dean’s shoulder, everywhere but at Dean.. “I think I know what you were going to say, before I stopped you. I’m sorry I stopped you. But If I’m right, then it was necessary.”

“Necessary?” Dean scrunches his face up in anger and confusion. “What the hell are you talking about ‘necessary.”

“It means I made a deal, which made it necessary you didn’t say what I think you were going to say.”

“Cas, what the hell!” Dean yells, tossing his hands up. “A deal?! _How many times have we been over this!_ ” Dean glowers at Castiel for a moment, who looks rightfully chastised, before asking, “What kind of deal.” 

“I--” Cas starts, then gets a defiant look in his eye. “I asked you first.”

“Seriously?” 

Cas’ raises a brow to say that yes he is serious, he’s _always_ serious.

Dean gives in with an angry “Fine.” and a huff.

“So. It was like I told you. Chuck gone. Eileen and Sam were together. Jack was back.” Dean swallows. Looks to Cas. Looks away. “And that was basically it. Just a, ya know, nice, homey, hunter existence. Not too over the top. Djinn did a good job. Probably why it trapped me for so long.” 

“There’s something that you’re leaving out.” 

Dean looks over at Castiel with frightened eyes, “What?”

“When I stopped you, you were talking about… us.” Castiel prompts carefully.

Dean could feel his heart pounding in his ears, and his whole body heat up suddenly like he’d just been tossed into an oven. Cas was looking at him with what seemed like… hope? _What the hell!_ Hadn’t the guy shot him down just a few weeks ago? And now he was...What? Dean had no idea. 

A voice in his head said _‘Fuck it_ ’, and as usual, when that voice said those magic words, Dean tended to just roll with the changes and ‘do the thing’. He takes a deep breath, then turns to give Cas a steady look.

“In the dream we were together. Like, together together. Hallmark movie, _lasso the moon_ , together.” 

Cas opens his mouth to respond but Dean decides he can’t actually hear what Cas might have to say right now, so keeps talking, stopping Cas before he starts.

  
“Okay, now you gotta explain why you blew me off, ‘cause you’d think a dude stops another dude from confessing that sort of thing ‘cause he--but you--”Dean stops and stares helplessly at Cas for a moment, who’s still smiling. “What I’m trying to say is I’m getting some crazy mixed signals here, man.”

“I’m sorry about the ‘mixed signals’. They aren’t really mixed. I mean, I’m not mixing them on purpose.” Castiel draws a hand over his face, obviously struggling as much as Dean had been. Good. “I do like you, Dean.” Castiel says, almost shyly but still with conviction. “In fact what I feel for you has long since passed ‘like’.” Castiel swallows and looks up at Dean.

“Yeah?” Dean asks, sounding hoarse.

Cas huffs a laugh, “Yeah.”

“I, uh, more than like you too. Or whatever.” Dean rubs at the back of his neck. “But why did you keep shooting me down? One minute I’m thinking we’re about to-- and the next you’re telling me you have to go. I mean, ever since the dream, it’s like you’ve been runnin’ hot and cold on me.”

“I had made a deal with The Empty--”

“Cas!” 

“It was to save Jack’s life, and I’ve already taken care of it. In fact, that’s why I was late to the party.”

“You’ve already taken care of it?” Dean asks in disbelief. “What kind of deal was it?”

“A soul for a soul. Jack get’s to stay out of The Empty, and then the moment I was ‘Truly at happy and at peace’ the Empty would come to collect me.”

Dean stares at Cas for a moment, dumbstruck, before shouting, “Dude, what the hell?!”

“It’s been taken care of. Rowena and Billy came up with a sort of… sleeping pill for the Empty. Runic stones that allow him to sleep even though I’m not there. It was part of the deal in releasing all the other Angels as well. I was helping Billy to deliver the stones before I came here.”

“So everything’s good now?” Dean asks gruffly.

“Yes.” Castiel sighs. “Everything has been settled. Like I said.”

“I really wanna be mad at you for making deals and keeping secrets. But you did fix everything. And I also _really wanna kiss you_ right now.”

“We could kiss now, and then you could yell at me about being an idiot later?”

“Deal.” Dean leans in and kisses Castiel.

They kiss for a moment before Dean begins to smile, so much so that it’s interrupting their kiss.

“What is it?” Castiel asks, amused and now with a smile to echo Dean’s, though he doesn’t know what they are smiling about.

“It’s just,” Dean laughs in disbelief. “All of this,” he shakes his head, laughing again. “It’s literally a dream come true.”

“You know what they say about letting your dreams stay dreams.”

“Okay, you are banned from the internet. Forever.” 

Castiel laughs, and Dean can’t help himself from leaning back into Cas’ space, pressing his lips against the grinning corner of Cas’ mouth, and down his jaw.

“Dean.” Castiel admonishes as the Hunter starts loosening Castiel’s tie and working the buttons open on his shirt. “Anyone could walk by and see us.”

“Let ‘em.” Dean growls, mouthing at the skin he’s exposed. “I’ve waited too damn long for this. If they see something it’s their own friggin’ fault for lookin’.” 

Castiel laughs, leaning his head back against the window with a dull thunk.

A few people do walk by on the way to their cars--including Garth--but the windows were too fogged up for any of them to see anything before they followed this sage advice: If the Impala’s rockin’, don’t come a knockin’.


End file.
